Le Lan, refocused

Phil VettelTribune restaurant critic

Few restaurants beckon from the street as invitingly as Le Lan, an Asian-French hybrid in River North. The large picture window, its edges frosted to create a transparent moon, offers passersby full views of the bamboo and green-tile dining room, continuing to the far wall, where a stunning mural depicts a sinuous, full-color dragon.

If the restaurant's good looks tempt you inside, as well they should, Bill Kim's food will keep you there. Kim, who joined the restaurant at the beginning of the year, previously spent a good deal of time working under legends Charlie Trotter and Philadelphia's Susanna Foo, and judging by his work at Le Lan, Kim was a star pupil. Kim's cooking is assured and bold, his plates pretty enough to hang on the walls--which is saying something in a room this beautiful.But the biggest thing Kim brings to Le Lan is focus. When the restaurant opened in 2004, then as now a partnership of Howard Davis, Roland Liccioni of Le Francais and Arun Sampanthavivat of Arun's, the menu was a push-me/pull-you contrast of French and Vietnamese influences. Under Kim, the menu is more definably Asian, and the remaining French elements are inflections, not competitors.

This approach brings the menu in harmony with the modern Asian decor, which besides the aforementioned mural (painted by Sampanthavivat's brother, Noi) includes regimented rows of halogen lights, tiny orchids at tableside (lan is the Vietnamese word for orchid) and a stunning four-panel piece rendered in black lacquer and mother-of-pearl.

First to the table are soft and yielding steamed buns, drizzled with reduced hoisin glaze. Our servers made it clear that there were more for the asking, and it took a fair amount of willpower not to indulge further.

First courses are dotted with familiar-sounding dishes--hot and sour soup, spring roll, soba noodle salad--but what arrives at the table is a far cry from the perfunctory creations you've probably experienced before. Kim's hot and sour soup, for instance, is a revelation, beginning with a rich, cornstarch-free stock that's then fortified with pieces of lump crab, crimson lentils and a tofu-egg crepe, so that the hot-sour flavor interplay is matched with textural contrasts as well. It's wonderful.

Buckwheat soba noodles are the nominal headliners in a chilled salad loaded with seafood treats, including razor and manila clams, mussels and remarkably tender calamari, brought together with splashes of black vinegar and lime plus citrus segments. A trio of panko-dusted tofu cubes are delicious, perked up by tart squares of pickled papaya and strands of pickled red onion.

Kim places indulgent, fatty pieces of pork belly in his densely packed pork-shrimp spring rolls, and the resulting nuggets are positively juicy. His notion of a surf-and-turf appetizer is to pair carpaccio-thin slices of Kobe-style beef with soft globes of trout roe, getting crunch from strips of marinated jicama and Lilliputian croutons of rosemary-garlic brioche.

Entrees average $26, but Kim packs these plates with extras. Tea-smoked duck breast slices with baby bok choy are matched to a melt-in-your-mouth cube of rosemary bread pudding, all over a complex reduction that offered hints of kumquat, star anise and orange flavors. Roasted Hawaiian mahi-mahi, coated with a little dehydrated coconut, come with curls of Chinese long beans and a delicious pineapple-cucumber relish, along with a curried pineapple sauce. And bright-red slices of mirin-marinated venison are propped against a pile of saffron basmati rice made with coconut milk and lime, over a very tart huckleberry reduction.

All this makes the menu's side dishes almost superfluous, but if the kitchen should happen to be offering white kimchi as its "kimchi of the day," indulge. This summer-style kimchi, which offers sweet and salty contrasts but no pepper to speak of, is likely to change your mind about this Korean fermented-cabbage staple.

Jennifer Jones' desserts are slowly inching away from Le Lan's original, very French sweets. You'll still find a creme brulee, for instance, but a lemon-grass coconut version that sits, out of its shallow dish, on a bed of finely chopped tropical fruits, with a vanilla-laced fruit sauce. The dessert souffle one night was a quince souffle with a lovely caramel-quince anglaise sauce.

And still on the menu, for now (Kim plans to ax it), is the killer chocolate moelleux, an oozy chocolate treat abetted by star-anise caramel, chocolate-cardamom sauce and spiced chocolate sorbet.

The wine list aims for food-friendliness, first and foremost, including fewer Californian chardonnays, say, than sauvignon blancs, Rhone-style blends and a good handful of German and Alsatian varietals. Some of the prices get rather high, but general manager Terry McNeese has made an effort to accommodate the lower price ranges as well.

Exemplary service can discuss the menu's fine points at length. The dining room is slightly crowded but never feels cramped. And perhaps I just got lucky, but the restaurant, once a very noisy space, seems much quieter these days, with no obvious soundproofing upgrades. Either the clientele has matured, or years of reviewing ear-splitting restaurants are starting to render me deaf.

A couple of weeks ago, Le Lan unveiled a second-floor room, available for private functions but perhaps for overflow seating as well. And Kim has ambitions of creating a lunch menu in April, perhaps a streamlined dim-sum format to accommodate the 60-minute crowd. When that debuts, Le Lan may be absolutely irresistible.

Le Lan (star) (star) (star)

749 N. Clark St.

312-280-9100

Open: Dinner Mon.-Sat.

Entree prices: $20-$36

Credit cards: A, DC, DS, M, V

Reservations: Strongly recommended

Noise: Conversation-friendly

Other: Wheelchair accessible; valet parking; no smoking

Ratings key:

OUTSTANDING (star) (star) (star) (star)

EXCELLENT (star) (star) (star)

VERY GOOD (star) (star)

GOOD (star)

SATISFACTORY

UNSATISFACTORY

Reviews are based on no fewer than two visits. The reviewer makes every effort to remain anonymous. Meals are paid for by the Tribune.